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Glu Mobile Overview
San Francisco, CA
501 to 1000 employees
2001
Company - Public (GLUU)
Computer Hardware & Software
$100 to $500 million (USD) per year
Glu is headquartered in San Francisco, with development studios in San Mateo and Burlingame, CA and a global presence extending to Toronto and Hyderabad, combining for just over 600 employees.
Our studios are hiring bright, hungry, innovative developers who ... Read more
Our studios are hiring bright, hungry, innovative developers who ... Read more
Mission: We strive to hire smart and motivated individuals and support their path to success. It’s important to us to take risks and evolve with our industry, so someone who sees mobile games as the future of entertainment is a great fit for Glu.
Join us ... Read more
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Company Updates
![Glu Mobile Logo]()
"New games are about growth but they’re also about opportunity." -Nick Earl
http://glassdoor.com/slink.htm?key=vQWNB1 Likes![Glu Mobile Logo]()
Here's just a snapshot of last quarters #wins.
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Glu Mobile – Why Work For Us?
Hello,
Welcome to our profile page. As you read through our reviews, you’ll see that Glu has experienced some tough moments in the past. On behalf of the leadership team, I want you to know that we are fully committed to our employees - we have heard you, and we are dedicated to continuously learn and improve. So thank you, both current and former employees, for your feedback and contributions.
Because of our passionate team, I have been inspired to play a larger role at Glu, as our new CEO. Since coming into this role in December 2016, I have made it my top priority to foster a creative environment, where every employee is a “game-maker” and has a voice with the opportunity to be innovative and contribute their ideas. I intend to build an environment where transparency and career development are central values. While we haven’t been able to consistently deliver on this in the past, I know we can moving forward.
While you are here working or visiting us, I hope you see some of what I see every day— driven and talented employees working as collaborative teams in a creative work environment. With a dedicated leadership team and a great collection of passionate studio teams, we intend for our games to become consumer favorites and push the boundaries of mobile gaming entertainment.
As you continue to read on, please enjoy the journey through our world. Take a few minutes to meet the team, learn about our history, review our core values and look at our current openings. If you’re interested in applying, we can’t wait to meet you. I hope you will join me in moving forward into the next chapter of Glu, embarking on a new era.
Thanks for reading,
Nick Earl
President & CEO
We’ve made our name in the mobile game industry with well-known player favorites like Cooking Dash, Deer Hunter, Racing Rivals, Tap Sports, and Contract Killer. If you check out Glu on the app store charts, you’ll find those titles as well as recent pop culture social games like Kim Kardashian: Hollywood, Kylie and Kendall, and Britney Spears: American Dream.
Glu is headquartered in the SoMa district in San Francisco, with game studios in San Mateo, CA, Burlingame, CA and Toronto, Canada. Our global presence extends to Toronto, Moscow, and Hyderabad, totaling just over 700 employees. We're proud to be recognized as a leader in mobile gaming across multiple genres.
Want to know what we've got going on in 2018? We're glad you're here! Check it out!
Is Glu a great place to work?
Yes. The answer is yes. Glu is so much fun!
The best part of coming to work at Glu at any of our locations is the people you work with – the development environment truly supports collaboration, creativity, and innovation. We understand that happy, healthy, creative people are at their best when they have time to refresh and relax, so we take work-life balance seriously. Our employees enjoy 16 days of PTO right off the bat, plus holidays, and a break during the winter holidays.
Across all locations, our goal is to encourage organic development of culture and identity. Whether your team is into Razor scooter races, mobile beer carts, playtests doubling as ice cream socials, dinosaur costume days, desk pranks, whatever…Glu supports whatever makes a team feel like a team.
The Cultural Ambassadors on Glu's HR team are dedicated to creating events to promote teambuilding; developing programs to strengthen our community and social connections; taking feedback to improve our work environment; and of course - food! All Glu locations have common spaces and kitchens fully stocked with all kinds of sustenance, ranging from fresh veggies to Doritos; coconut water to Mountain Dew; organic fruit to Fruit Roll-ups.
Glu studios are close-knit, agile squads of engineers, designers, artists, product managers, producers, and quality assurance testers working side-by-side. Developers describe the development process as fulfilling and fun - our game teams have the support and freedom required to create a game from prototype to initial release, and continuous innovation during live operations and content updates.
You can tell right away that each Glu studio has its own vibe and energy, but the collaboration between teams and studios is an important part of our philosophy. Our goal is to share learning across the entire company, but give teams the freedom to work toward their own definition of success.
Our studios are encouraged to run independently, with the benefit and support of resources from Glu's HQ. Studio leaders love that they get to build and grow their own teams organically while investing in their employees, managing their own milestone process, and releasing fantastic games.
Glu creates games in several genres, with each studio dedicated as experts to their particular gameplay category. Studio leaders are encouraged to develop their teams, their games, and their methodologies to make the best fit for their studio's culture and philosophy.
Meet some of our leaders!
Studio Leaders
Glu Play
Name & Title: Becky Ann Hughes, General Manager
Location: San Francisco, CA
Years with GluPlay: 6
Recent/upcoming titles: Diner Dash X, Cooking Dash, Gordon Ramsay Dash
Glu Pen
Name & Title: Jerome Collin, VP, General Manager
Location: San Mateo, CA & Long Beach, CA
Years with GluPen: 2.5
Recent/upcoming titles: Tap Sports Baseball, Tap Sports Baseball '16, Tap Sports Football, Racing Rivals
Glu Toronto
Name & Title: Dave Waisglass, Vice President Casual RPG Games
Location: Toronto, ON
Years with Glu Toronto:5
Recent/upcoming titles: Stardom: Hollywood, Kim Kardashian: Hollywood, Kendall & Kylie, Taylor Swift
Glu Hyderabad
Name & Title: Imran Khan, Senior Director, General Manager
Location: Hyderabad, India
Years with Glu Hyderabad: 3.5
Recent/upcoming titles: Terminator Genisys, Dino Hunter, Sniper X
Glu Moscow
Name & Title: Marina Sokolova, Head of Studio
Location: Moscow, Russia
Years with Glu Moscow: 8
Recent/upcoming titles: Contract Killer, Deer Hunter, James Bond: World of Espioage
Executive Leaders
Nick Earl, President and CEO
Eric Ludwig, Chief Operating Officer & Chief Financial Officer
Tim Wilson, Global Chief Technology Officer
Chris Akhavan, Chief Revenue Officer
Greg Cannon, Vice President of Finance & Investor Relations
Scott Leichtner, Vice President & General Counsel
Sheila Ryan, Vice President, Global Human Resources
Dominic Martinelli, Vice President, Information Technology
Glu Mobile Reviews
Glu Mobile187Approve of CEO
Nick Earl
48 Ratings
- Featured Review
Helpful (1)
![Glu Mobile Logo]()
"A good place to work"
StarStarStarStarStar- Work/Life Balance
- Culture & Values
- Career Opportunities
- Comp & Benefits
- Senior Management
RecommendsPositive OutlookApproves of CEOI have been working at Glu Mobile full-time (Less than a year)
Pros
Glu has been as good as any other place to work. Environment is nice. Compensation is nice. People are friendly. My schedule is manageable. I thrive on success and as long as Glu and I are both succeeding, I am happy.
Cons
My big concern is that people making fundamental decisions are not creatives and want to make informed, data supported, games. But in an industry as fast paced as mobile, that doesn't make a lot of sense. By the time you've cloned Clash of Clans, it's too late. You have to have new ideas.
Glu also has the unique and dubious history of cloning it's OWN games, which makes zero sense to me. I remember they had two Tiny Tower clones back in the day.Advice to Management
1. Make new games quickly, but build teams slowly. In mobile, you can make a prototype with 3-4 people. A prototype team doesn't need to be bigger than that. In fact, more people with dilute the core vision. Eventually, if the game is fun, you can move it into full production.
2. Stop cloning games. Especially your own games. Diner Dash is not a genre.Glu Mobile 2018-01-21 13:22 PST
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Glu Mobile Interviews
Experience
Experience
72%
14%
14%
Getting an Interview
Getting an Interview
67%
16%
11%
4
2
Difficulty
2.7
Average- Featured InterviewAccepted OfferPositive ExperienceAverage InterviewGlu Mobile 2017-05-25 07:38 PDT
Application
I applied through a recruiter. I interviewed at Glu Mobile (San Francisco, CA) in April 2017.
Interview
There were about three phone conversations: one with a recruiter, two with a technical director. Then there was a game engineering sprint simulation to demo a couple of game features. This was the most relevant part of the interview, because I ascribe to the assessment philosophy that a new hire can only demonstrate their ability to pass the interview tests, so I appreciated that the technical director and director of engineering simulated the requirements specification and task completion that happens in a game engineering sprint. I felt they were assessing relevant skills of how well I would program and collaborate to quickly make a game feature that players might value.
After that there was an 4-hour on-site panel with a dozen people: director of engineering, platform engineer, three game engineers, two producers, one product manager, a designer, creative director, general manager, technical director, and recruiter. I was asked a few programming questions and a few questions on teamwork and game opinions. I was invited to ask about teamwork that I was seeking.
I left the best job I have had to I accept this offer because of two reasons: (1) The technical director, product manager, and general manager gave examples of prioritizing low-cost and high-value game features. (2) The take-home skill test simulated making a potentially valuable game feature. So I feel confident that we will be trusting each other to quickly deliver game features that players value most.Interview Questions
- In my free time, I was asked to make two specific features for a game related to their franchise. I was asked to discuss the details through an online document, given base code, and asked to deliver the two features. It was the most relevant assessment I've had in any interview, so I won't spoil its details here. 2 Answers
Glu Mobile Awards & Accolades
- Crunchies Award, TechCrunch, 2015
- Top 50 Developer, PocketGamer, 2015
Work at Glu Mobile? Share Your Experiences
